The Vice President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, today inspected, the new Emirates’ Airbus A380 Concourse 3, the world’s first dedicated facility at Dubai International Airport that is home to Airliner’s growing fleet of super jumbos. It features dedicated first and business class lounges.

They toured various sections of Concourse 3, which is scheduled to receive its first flight in January 2013.

Sheikh Mohammed began his tour with the new Free Market which includes several Malls for retail business spread over a total area of more than 1200 square meters.

During his one-hour visit, Sheikh Mohammed toured the Airbus 380-designated gates designated for lining up aircrafts, equipped with load bridges for passengers to move between the aircraft and the Terminal, and six other gates dedicated to serving aircraft parked away from the terminal. He also toured the luxury first-class and businessmen’s lounges, which have been equipped to the latest global standards.

Sheikh Mohammed was briefed by Engineer Khalifa Al Zafeen, the CEO of Dubai Aviation City on this huge project and its components. Concourse 3 is 650 metres in length and 90 m in width and covers a total area of 530,000 meters with 11 stories, four of them underground. There are automated passenger transport points for arrivals and departures.

Concourse 3 has five-star and four-star hotels, a Mall with 40 counters to follow flights and airlines. It also has an internal metro that carries passengers to and from Terminal 3, which is dedicated for Emirates Airlines, and Terminal 2 with a capacity of 19 million passengers annually. Overall, Concourse 2 and 3 will have a capacity of 43 million passengers annually.

Visitors and residents of many nationalities coming to the UAE through Terminal 3 welcomed Sheikh Mohammed as he toured the arrivals Hall and inspected work performance on the counters. Sheikh Mohammed also rode on the metro to Burj Khalifa, passing through several stations where some of Dubai’s attractions were displayed.

The Vice President expressed his pride at the implementation of the Dubai Metro, which he described as ’’the Project of the Century.’’ His last stop was the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa, from whose metro station he and his entourage walked to the adjacent mall through the 820 metre walkway, built by Emaar Property at a total cost of AED 120 million.

Sheikh Mohammed then had a coffee at one of the outlets in the Mall where he was greeted by a large number of people.